1. Reginald Lewis was one of the richest Black American men in the 1980s, and the first African-American to build a billion-dollar company: TLC Beatrice International Holdings Inc.
13 Facts About Reginald Lewis
1. 2.
Reginald Lewis won a football scholarship to Virginia State University and joined the Alpha Phi chapter of Kappa Alpha Psi while an undergraduate student.
3.
Reginald Lewis completed his Juris Doctor at Harvard Law in 1968.
4.
Reginald Lewis had learned from an article in Fortune that the Esmark holding company, which recently purchased Norton Simon, planned to divest from the McCall Pattern Company, a maker of home sewing patterns founded in 1870.
5.
Reginald Lewis managed to negotiate the price down, then raised $1 million from family and friends and borrowed the rest from institutional investors and investment banking firm First Boston Corp.
6.
Reginald Lewis then started to recruit managers from rival companies.
7.
Reginald Lewis strengthened McCall by containing costs, improving quality, beginning to export to China, and emphasizing new product introductions.
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Norton Simon 8.
In 1987, Reginald Lewis bought Beatrice International Foods from Beatrice Companies for $985 million, renaming it TLC Beatrice International Holdings Inc.
9.
Reginald Lewis's first major grant was an unsolicited $1 million to Howard University in 1988; the federal government matched the grant, making the gift $2 million, which was used to fund an endowment for scholarships, fellowships, and faculty sabbaticals.
10.
In 1992, Reginald Lewis donated $3 million to Harvard Law School, the largest grant at the time in the school's history.
11.
Reginald Lewis was counsel to the New York-based Commission for Racial Injustice.
12.
On January 19,1993, Reginald Lewis died at age 50 from brain cancer.
13.
Reginald Lewis was married to Loida Nicolas Reginald Lewis, a Filipina lawyer.